The Myth We Choose Nduduzo Makhathini

• 1 Kuzodlula 04:43
• 2 Imvunge KaNtu 03:01
• 3 Kwamabili 03:10
• 4 Unembeza 04:24
• 5 Liyoze Line Nangakithi 04:26
• 6 What People Say 03:05
• 7 Primordial Egg 02:31
• 8 Ekuqaleni 02:15
• 9 Ḽiṅwalo ḽa Mubebi 06:22
• 10 Umbono 05:02
• 11 Ḽiṅwalo ḽa Mubebi (reprise) 02:40
• 12 Tethered 05:37
• 13 Ongaphesheya 02:48
• 14 What People Say (reprise) 06:24
• 15 Kuzodlula (reprise) 02:26
• 16 Zimthilili 05:09
• Total Runtime 01:04:03

Info for The Myth We Choose

Nduduzo Makhathini releases "The Myth We Choose", the fourth Blue Note album by the acclaimed South African pianist, composer, healer, and philosopher. The album is introduced today with the release of the stunning the lead track “Kuzodlula” on which Makhathini contemplates the nature of forgiveness — “real forgiveness is the very attempt to forgive the unforgivable,” he says.

Co-produced by Makhathini and his 18-year-old son, Thingo Makhathini, The Myth We Choose features riveting performances by the pianist’s working trio with bassist Dalisu Ndlazi and drummer Lukmil Perez (or, on select tracks, Ayanda Sikade), plus special guests including Shabaka Hutchings and a stacked lineup of South African talent: DJ and producer Black Coffee, trumpeter Robin Fassie, guitarist Keenan Ahrends, and the vocalists Thando Zide, Muneyi and Omagugu, Makhathini’s spouse and longtime collaborator. This is music made for posterity — even eternity.

The album finds Makhathini expanding his soundworld, thanks in large part to Thingo, who helped his father steer the album. A producer, songwriter and musician, Thingo has developed a deep and wide-ranging understanding of music old and strikingly new, which proves transformative throughout The Myth We Choose. “Every time you hear a connection to electronics, or different kinds of grooves that people don’t as often associate with me, those are his ideas,” says Makhathini.

Songs are vital to a culture’s myth-making, Makhathini argues, which makes them essential to how future generations perceive history. “I have always felt that songs speak to us, songs look at us,” he writes in the album’s liner notes. “In years to come, it will be the histories of the day that will choose or not choose our songs. If our songs are not chosen, then our voices would never be heard… On the contrary, if our songs are chosen, then indeed, what we are dealing with now is designing future myths. With our actions today, we are making suggestions for what tomorrow may be.”

That’s a profound ambition for an LP, but coming from Makhathini, it’s hardly surprising. To the 43-year-old South African — an educator and healer as well as a venerated musician — a performance is a ritual that demands real engagement from its audience and does an incredible amount of conceptual heavy lifting. Music invokes personal, familial and cultural stories, Makhathini says. Music is prophecy. Music can restore physical vitality.

Ultimately, The Myth We Choose is about the awareness to create a legacy of love and healing in the present tense. “This notion of a Black body as being animated and used for entertainment has failed historically,” says Makhathini. “So, for me, accepting the failure of Black performance, I resort to this idea of ritual” — the idea of past, present and future all commingling on the same plane. What’s more, in this ritual the composer, performers and audience become equal partners, facing the sounds that inspire self-reflection with open hearts.

“Wayne Shorter said something really beautiful that I liked some years ago,” Makhathini continues. “His idea was to play and write music the way you want the world to be, the world that you hope for. That’s always my purpose.”

"Makhathini takes myth as a point of departure and delivers a varied, blissfully melodic experience rich in character and atmosphere. This is an album that continues to reveal itself, captivating more deeply as it progresses." (jazztrail.net)

Nduduzo Makhathini, piano, vocals, vocoder, synthesizer
Dalisu Ndlazi, double bass
Lukmil Perez, drums
Guests:
Robin Fassie, trumpet (track 1)
Shabaka, flute (track 5)
Omagugu, vocals (tracks 6, 14)
Ayanda Sikade, drums (tracks 7, 16)
Muneyi, vocals (tracks 9, 11)
Keenan Ahrends, guitar (track 10)
Black Coffee, drum programming (track 14)
Thando Zide, vocals (track 12)

Please Note: We offer this album in its native sampling rate of 48kHz, 24-bit. The provided 96kHz version was up-sampled and offers no audible value!

Nduduzo Makhathini
grew up in the lush and rugged hillscapes of umGungundlovu in South Africa, a peri-urban landscape in which music and ritual practices were symbiotically linked. The area is significant historically as the site of the Zulu king Dingane kingdom between 1828 and 1840. It’s important to note that the Zulu, in fact the African warrior code, is deeply reliant on music for motivation and healing. This deeply embedded symbiosis is key to understanding Makhathini’s vision.

The church also played a role in Makhathini’s musical understanding, as he hopped from church to church in his younger days in search of only the music. The legends of South African jazz are deep influences as well, in particular Bheki Mseleku, Moses Molelekwa, and Abdullah Ibrahim. “The earlier musicians put a lot of emotions in the music they played,” he says. “I think it may also be linked to the political climate of those days. I also feel there is a uniqueness about South African jazz that created an interest all around the world and we are slowly losing that too in our music today. I personally feel that our generation has to be very conscious about retaining these nuances in the music we play today.”

Through his mentor Mseleku, Makhathini was also introduced to the music of John Coltrane’s classic quartet with McCoy Tyner. “I came to understand my voice as a pianist through John Coltrane’s A Love Supreme,” he says. “As someone who started playing jazz very late, I had always been looking for a kind of playing that could mirror or evoke the way my people danced, sung, and spoke. Tyner provided that and still does in meaningful ways.” Makhathini also cites American jazz pianists including Andrew Hill, Randy Weston, and Don Pullen as significant influences.

Active as an educator and researcher, Makhathini is the head of the music department at Fort Hare University in the Eastern Cape. He has performed at renowned festivals including the Cape Town International Jazz Festival and the Essence Festival (in both New Orleans and South Africa), and in 2019 made his debut appearances the Blue Note Jazz Club in New York City, as well as Jazz at Lincoln Center where he was a featured guest with Wynton Marsalis and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra on their 3-night musical celebration The South African Songbook in Rose Theater. He is a member of Shabaka Hutchings’ band Shabaka and the Ancestors appearing on their 2016 album Wisdom of Elders, and has also collaborated with artists including Logan Richardson, Nasheet Waits, Tarus Mateen, Stefon Harris, Billy Harper, Azar Lawrence, and Ernest Dawkins.

In addition to producing albums for his peers (such as Thandiswa Mazwai’s Belede and Tumi Mogorosi’s Project Elo), Makhathini has released eight albums of his own since 2014 when he founded the label Gundu Entertainment in partnership with his wife and vocalist Omagugu Makhathini. Those albums earned him multiple awards and include Sketches of Tomorrow (2014), Mother Tongue (2014), Listening to the Ground (2015), Matunda Ya Kwanza (2015); Icilongo: The African Peace Suite (2016), Inner Dimensions (2016), and Reflections (2016). His 2017 album Ikhambi was the first to be released on Universal Music South Africa and won Best Jazz Album at the South African Music Awards (SAMA) in 2018. His Blue Note debut Modes of Communication: Letters from the Underworlds will be released in 2020.

This album contains no booklet.